Two hoodies can weigh exactly the same on paper and feel completely different on a cold morning. The gap is rarely about weight. It is about what the inside of the fabric is doing.
Most hoodie descriptions lead with a number and stop there. Heavier sounds warmer, so a bigger number wins. It is a reasonable assumption and it is only half right. Weight tells you how much fabric there is. It does not tell you how that fabric is built, and construction is the part that decides whether warm air stays against you or drifts off the moment you step outside. Here is what actually separates a plain cotton hoodie from a fleece-lined one, in plain terms.
Start hereWeight and warmth are two different measurements
Fabric weight is measured in gsm, grams per square metre. A 300gsm fabric weighs 300 grams for every square metre of it. Higher numbers generally mean a thicker, denser cloth. That is genuinely useful information: it tells you whether a hoodie will hang with some structure or cling and crease.
What gsm cannot tell you is how the fabric handles air. Warmth in clothing is mostly about trapped air, not about mass. Still air is a poor conductor of heat, so a fabric that holds a layer of it against your skin keeps you warmer than a denser fabric that lets air move straight through. This is why two garments at the same gsm can behave quite differently once you are wearing them.
Option onePlain cotton: breathable, and it lets heat go
A standard cotton jersey, the knit used for tee shirts, has a flat face and a flat back. There is very little surface texture on the inside, so there is very little structure to hold air against your skin. Air moves through it easily. That is exactly what you want in summer and exactly what you do not want when the temperature drops.
Loopback French terry sits a step up. It has a smooth outer face and small loops on the reverse, and those loops create a bit of depth for air to sit in. The result is moderate warmth that stays breathable, which makes it a sensible choice for mild days and for anything active. What it is not is a cold-morning fabric. The loops are open, so warm air escapes fairly readily.
Neither of these is a flaw. Both fabrics are doing the job they were built for. The trouble starts when a thin cotton hoodie gets sold as a winter layer, because you end up wearing something that breathes beautifully at precisely the moment you would rather it did not.
Option twoFleece-lined: a brushed surface that holds air
Fleece-lined fabric starts from a similar place, then the inside face is brushed. Brushing lifts the fibres into a soft, raised pile, and that pile is full of tiny pockets. Those pockets hold still air directly against your skin, and that trapped air is what does the insulating. It is the same principle behind a duvet: the filling is not warm in itself, it just stops warm air from leaving.
This is the reason a fleece-lined hoodie can feel noticeably warmer than a plain cotton one of similar weight. It is not doing anything exotic. It simply has somewhere for the warm air to stay.
The trade-off is breathability. A brushed interior that holds heat well will hold it whether or not you want it to, which is why a heavy fleece is better suited to standing around on a cold morning than to running for a train. Worth knowing before you buy, rather than after.
The numbersWhere gsm actually fits in
Commonly cited ranges put lightweight hoodie fabric at roughly 180 to 250gsm, midweight at roughly 280 to 350gsm, and heavyweight from around 350gsm upwards. Different mills and brands draw the lines in slightly different places, so treat these as a rough map rather than a standard.
Read gsm alongside construction rather than instead of it. A 400gsm fabric with a flat interior and a 400gsm fabric with a brushed interior are not the same garment, and the label will rarely tell you which one you are holding. The two questions worth asking are what the fabric weighs and what the inside of it is doing.
| Fabric | Inside surface | What it does | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cotton jersey | Flat and smooth | Breathes freely, holds very little air | Warm days, layering underneath |
| Loopback French terry | Small open loops | Moderate warmth, stays breathable | Mild mornings, anything active |
| Brushed fleece | Raised, soft pile | Traps still air against the skin | Cold starts, evenings, travel |
| sft. Cloud Hoodie | Fleece-lined, smooth outer face | 460gsm with a brushed interior that holds warmth, and a clean outside that does not read as gym gear | Most of the Australian year |
How the Cloud Hoodie is put together
The sft. Cloud Hoodie is a 460gsm heavyweight, fleece-lined on the inside and smooth on the outside. That combination is deliberate. The brushed interior does the warmth, and the clean outer face keeps the whole thing looking closer to knitwear than to sportswear. It is cut with dropped shoulders and a cord-free hood, with a kangaroo pocket, ribbed cuffs and a ribbed hem, in sizes XS to 2XL.
The fabric is a cotton and polyester blend, chosen so the fleece stays dense and the shape stays put through wash after wash. The blend is not a compromise on quality. It is what makes the construction work. There is more on why each detail is the way it is in The Make.
460gsm, fleece-lined inside, smooth outside. Cord-free hood, dropped shoulders, sizes XS to 2XL.
Frequently asked questions
Is a fleece-lined hoodie too warm for Australian weather?
For most of the country it works across a long stretch of the year, because the way you wear it does a lot of the regulating. Hood down and sleeves pushed on a mild afternoon, hood up on a cold morning, worn over a tee rather than a long sleeve. A heavyweight gives you range precisely because it holds its shape when you are not asking much of it.
Does a heavier hoodie always mean a warmer hoodie?
No. Weight and warmth track each other loosely, but construction breaks the pattern. A brushed, fleece-lined interior traps air against the skin in a way a flat interior cannot, so a fleece-lined fabric will usually feel warmer than a plain one at a similar gsm. Look at both numbers and build.
Why use a cotton and polyester blend rather than pure cotton?
Density and shape retention. A blended heavyweight holds its fleece and its cut through repeated washing, where a pure cotton fleece of the same weight is more prone to relaxing out of shape over time. The Cloud Hoodie is blended for that reason, not to save on the fabric.
What gsm counts as a heavyweight hoodie?
Commonly cited ranges start heavyweight at around 350gsm. At 460gsm the Cloud Hoodie sits well above that line, which is what gives it the structure to hang from the shoulder rather than cling.
Warmth you can actually wear.
The sft. Cloud Hoodie. 460gsm fleece-lined heavyweight in Moss, Sky Blue, Black and Mocha. $148 AUD, designed on the Gold Coast.
Shop the Cloud Hoodie